April's Editor's Letter: Own your mistakes

Sometimes, I think we have a tendency to look at successful people and imagine they just sprang out of a box somewhere, as a ready-made pop star, or doctor, or even a magazine editor. But everyone has a career history. And within that history, everyone’s made mistakes.

Yes, even Hollywood mess up.

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On a day-to-day basis, we’re all terrified of messing up. No one wants to look stupid, or feel they’ve failed, even in a little way. But mistakes are often the most expedient route to knowledge. The badges we can wear that show we survived and we grew from the experience.

The stupidest incident of my early career taught me a significant lesson. It was my first day at my job as a publicist for the TV show Neighbours. I had to photocopy some stuff. Standard. The photocopier looked like it had travelled back in time from the year 2082. So complicated. But how embarrassing, right, to ask how to use a photocopier? So I didn’t. And when, almost immediately, the paper jammed, I was frustrated and embarrassed and skulked away, figuring I would choose Day Two to learn how to use the photocopier from the alien planet.

Minutes later, an enraged man came bursting into the office I shared with six other people, clutching some scraps of paper. “WHO left this jammed in the photocopier? I found it there, smouldering. YOU COULD HAVE BURNED THE PLACE DOWN.”

Well, the only thing burning was my face as I tried to apologise in a shaky, mousey voice. Lesson: if you don’t know something, just bloody ask. It was the Work Fails feature on page 64 that had me reliving this mortifying moment all over again. And to ease the shame, I asked the GLAMOUR team to share some of their work clangers as well. Feel our pain. And laugh with us. We can do that now. Just about.

“In my first months as the most junior person on a film mag, I interviewed Patrick Stewart and got a very mild X Men exclusive – then got home and accidentally recorded over my file. I literally screamed. Work were so kind about it the next day that I almost cried again.” - Kat Brown, Social Media Editor

“I was interning at a fashion magazine, filling a lift with three rails of couture when one rail collapsed. It split my face and I was buried for three floors. When the doors opened, the assistant yelled – I thought from concern, but she was panicking that I’d get blood on the couture. I then had to sign a form saying it was my fault and take myself to the hospital.” - Gregory Allen, Beauty Assistant

“I was invited, via email, to the book launch party of a reality TV ‘star’ at 3pm on the same day, and I forwarded it to my desk mate, saying, ‘I’m not sure what I’m more insulted by, that they think I’m interested in this, or that they’ve invited me so late that I’m clearly a second-tier invitee.’ Yup, sent it to the star’s PR by mistake. Realised the second I hit ‘send’. The only thing I could do was call the PR and apologise profusely.” - Helen Whitaker, Entertainment Editor

“When I was an eager intern, I got invited to a fab Fashion Week party and got really drunk. The next morning, I woke up to a call from my editor asking me where I was. It was the morning of the Oscars, when I’d been expected to be at work at around 5.30am. And I was still drunk. I slurred/shouted: ‘I’M IN MA BED.’ I rocked up an hour later, mortified and bleary-eyed. I’ve never got drunk on a work night since.” - Leanne Bayley, Content Editor

“I was spraying myself with perfume at my desk. I’d only been in the role for a couple of weeks, and I sat next to my boss. She asked if I’d just sprayed anything because she’d started to feel unwell. Turns out she’s severely allergic to perfume. Great start.” - Ali Pantony, Deputy Features Editor

This article was first published in the April 2017 issue of Glamour magazine